Centcom Chief: US Needs More Troops in Syria

Defense Secretary James Mattis hasn’t finalized his recommendations for the ISIS war, and doesn’t expect to do so until the end of the month, but Central Command chief Gen. Joseph Votel seems pretty sure that he’d like more troops to command in Syria, and that could mean a significant expansion of US ground troops in Syria.

Much of this appears to be centered on the desire for the US to capture the ISIS capital city of Raqqa, and their announced offensive against Raqqa began months ago, with Kurdish YPG forces leading the way, and hasn’t resulted in much territory changing hands.

The plans reportedly in consideration include substantial increases to US arms shipments to the Kurds, a move which would doubtless anger neighboring Turkey. Votel appeared in favor of this idea, but said it was also possible for the US to bring in some other rebel faction to prop up for the attacks.

There is also speculation that Mattis may order an increase in ground troops to Iraq, though the US commander in Iraq insisted he believed he had all the authority and resources to win already, meaning the focus is likely more heavily on Syria when the announcement does come.

Author: Jason Ditz

4 thoughts on “Centcom Chief: US Needs More Troops in Syria”

This is a power grab and a backdoor entry into Syria where from there they will march into Damascus. I wonder if the General received permission from the Assad government? If not, General Mattis would be violating international law.

Sure, but as long as you understand that the US has to go through Russia to get to Syria and then Iran. It almost certainly calls for a nuclear world war. Not to mention that China will be involved too because of their interests.

There’s just no way we should stop telling Americans the facts of the matter.
Obama completely and utterly fu–ed up any future progress on the PNAC agenda.

And also, Obama did the same when he allowed his country to be a signatory to the Iran nuclear deal.

Is there any American who doesn’t understand how bad a deal that was? It’s effectively placed Russia and China between the US and Iran and made war against Iran so difficult now that there’s nothing to stop Iran from procuring those nuclear weapons!

Trump would have never did either and that tells us a lot about Trump. And besides, Trump is white.